It may be desirable to allow devices to have a communications link, such as the ability to connect to the Internet or to gateways, using a first protocol-defined network, such as IEEE 802.15.4, IEEE 802.11, or Bluetooth. The gateway may use a second protocol, such as a third generation partnership project (3GPP) protocol, to connect to the Internet. These devices may not be registered with or known to the 3GPP network, and they may not have 3GPP compliant radios. These devices may be referred to as capillary network devices and may connect to the 3GPP network via gateways.
Machine to machine (M2M) devices as well as ordinary wireless communication devices may have limited functionality. This limited functionality may include certain types of wireless radios, such as short range wireless technologies like 802.11 and Bluetooth. These devices may lack cellular communication technology, such as 3GPP radios or other similar cellular wireless communication technology. These types of devices, when co-located, may form a capillary network, and may communicate with each other using the available short range wireless technology. One or more devices in the capillary network may be 3GPP compliant devices.
As such, it is desirable to have a method and apparatus to identify, address, and trigger devices that are connected behind 3GPP compliant gateways. Further, it is desirable to have a method and apparatus for a gateway or a machine type communication (MTC) server to create MTC groups and assign group IDs to devices that are connected behind 3GPP compliant gateways.